by Adam Holt
“Stay for a moment and let me explain. A few days ago a virtual conference was held in your father’s study. In the corner of that study there stood a very curious figure—a Handroid with oversized hologlasses who shouted ‘No!’ when your dad accepted his next assignment. I am very adept at reading people and situations, Tully. Do you know what I read?”
I shook my head and tried to pull away from his grip, but he held me firm.
“In the past, people would have called you a ‘misguided youth,’ sneaking behind your father’s back and lying to cover your tracks. You are the kind of boy who would have hopped on a riverboat just to see where it would take you. Yes, people would have said that you had ‘a lot of nerve.’ But do you know what?”
“What?”
“I like a lot of nerve. For now, your secrets are safe with me.”
He took his hand off my shoulder and gave me a light push toward the side door. I didn’t look back.
It was once again perfectly sunny outside though the ground was wet from the rain. I waited for my dad at the cafeteria as planned. What a day! I thought. If I had gone to Hangar One, I could have toured The Adversity. I might have found a place to hide. That was the easy path, but the journey to Hangar Two was more like my dad’s motto: “Through hardship to the stars.” Now my hands were shaking. My eyes felt sunburned. I felt lucky to be alive.
I also felt confused. “Lightning never strikes the same place twice,” they say. What about four times? It made more sense now why my dad wanted to get it off the Earth.
Finally, Lincoln Sawyer was way too smart, and he knew I was sneaking around. Why did he let me go? I thought that Androids were programmed to follow the rules, but he released me. Maybe he thought my dad had enough on his mind and didn’t need to worry about his troublesome son. He also thought I had a lot of nerve. Usually when Dr. Vindler says that to me, it’s an insult. You’ve got a lot of nerve handing in these incomplete notes, Tully Harper. Sawyer meant it as a compliment. I guess I did have a lot of nerve, sneaking around and plotting to get on board a spaceship. Maybe Sawyer thought I was brave—or crazy. Or both. I just hope he never figures out that I want to sneak into space. He won’t hide that from my dad.
I was pondering these questions when I felt a hand on my shoulder again. I jumped like a scared armadillo, but it was just my dad.
“Whoa, easy there, son,” he said. “How was the tour? Did you learn anything new today?
“No, nothing.” I said. “Just a pretty basic tour of the ship. And stuff. What about you?”
“Oh, just a bit more than I wanted to know about the Harper Device.” He ran his hand along the red streak in his hair.
“Are they going to keep it here?” I asked.
“Tully?” He frowned at me. “Who told you it was here?”
“Oh, you know. That was the rumor,” I lied. “But I guess you just confirmed it. Don’t worry. I can keep a secret.”
He eyed me suspiciously. “Well, we’ve found a safer home for the Device than where it is now. I’ll tell you about it soon enough.”
I didn’t feel right about lying to my dad, but maybe Sawyer was right: I had a lot of nerve. I didn’t know if that made me good or bad, but I knew it would help me sneak into space. So would my two best friends.
PART TWO: HOW TO SNEAK INTO SPACE AND SURVIVE
GRAWWLLL!
Okay, this is where the misguided youth with a lot of nerve might want to take some notes.
Getting into space was a million times trickier than I thought. Problem One was when and where we could actually meet to talk about the other 999,999 problems. We couldn’t work at the Tirelli’s house with four miniature tornado brothers swirling around and a super glued keyboard. We needed peace and a working computer. The Chakravortys’ house was out of the question, too. Sunjay’s mom and dad didn’t snoop around our summer activities much, but his younger sister Sanjeetha did. As a third grader, she was too young to venture beyond their house and backyard, so whenever we visited Sunjay’s house, she clung to us like stink on a skunk. That left a handful of other locations.
“How about the library?” I said.
“When’s the last time you went to the library?” said Tabitha. “That would be pretty strange. Mrs. Stevens would want to help you find the right book. She’d make sure we were reading, too.”
“Who’s Mrs. Stevens?”
“The librarian.”
“What about Yogurtland?!” blurted Sunjay. “Why can’t we research there? We can look at maps of The Adversity on the 3D internet tables.”
“3D Internet,” said Little Bacon from the back of the room. “It offers users a chance to interact with websites without the use of a mouse or keyboard.”
“Oh, sorry,” I said, “Little Bacon, please shut yourself off.”
“Oooh, your handroid!” said Tabitha. “I forgot about him. Leave him on. He’ll be useful.”
“Thank you, young lady,” he said. “I am glad to help.”
“Okay, but we’re getting off topic, guys,” I said. “Yogurtland is a cool place, but everyone will wonder what we’re doing. Our whole school loves that place. Why do they serve ice cream anyway? I mean, it’s a yogurt shop.”
“Bingo! Bingdingalingo!” shouted Tabitha. Her eyes brightened. I could feel a Tabism coming from a mile away. “It’s perfect. Why sneak around when we can sneak around sneaking around? Cave-In!, pancakes, and trampo. You’re dad won’t even think. All that kids stuff we always do. Perfect! ”
I shook my head. “In English this time, please.”
“Come on, guys, we work right under Commander Harper’s nose in Mission Control. That way we can jump on your trampoline, play Cave-In!, and eat pancakes in the morning—it will seem totally normal. Only we’ll be planning our own mission.”
It was worth a try. Later that night, I asked Dad what his plans were for the next day. Sure enough the Space Alliance called him to a meeting. He wouldn’t return until dinner. “I’ll make breakfast. Can you fend for yourself for lunch?”
“There’s always cornflakes,” I replied. Mmm, cornflakes.
That next morning Sunjay, Tabitha, and I ate banana pancakes, gathered in Mission Control, closed the door, and began to plan. Sunjay wore jeans and a concert tee, I had on cargo shorts and flip-flops, and Tabitha was wearing a long skirt and, as she always did, a scarf. Her lucky scarf. “I wear it to all my dress rehearsals. I wore it to my exams last year and made straight A’s,” she explained. Did she really need luck for that?
Tabitha found the scarf in a vintage clothing store on a trip to Austin. It looked like any other gray scarf when she found it in the clearance bin. As she flung it around her neck, the cloth suddenly burst into color. It turned sky blue, with white clouds blowing across the surface. “It’s a mood scarf,” she told me, “and the colors change when my moods change. But I swear it can read my thoughts! It’s dire valuable and vintage, but the shop owner didn’t know she even had it in stock. She said, ‘Oh, my dear, you’ve found a lost treasure. I could never sell something that precious. I guess I’ll have to give it to you as a gift.’”
Tabitha rarely wore the scarf to school because teachers found it distracting, especially when she grew excited and the scarf sprung to life with color. Today it was dark green with flashes of white flying across it like shooting stars. It did bring out the color in her eyes, but now wasn’t the time for daydreaming. Now was the time for planning.
Tabitha and Sunjay both sat down on the brown couch in Mission Control and I began the day with a formal speech. For some reason, my hands were clammy and so was my forehead.
“Glad you could, uh, all make it,” I said. “My friends, we have a problem: my Dad’s going into space. That’s sort of a problem, but it’s not, uh, really the problem.” On the LiveWall I pulled up a map of the United States and stood by Houston. “As you can see, all three of us have to get from here in Houston all the way to here in Florida.” I leaned to reach for Florida. “But that’s n
ot the real problem.”
“Correct,” said Tabitha. “Not a problem. I got that one figured out already.”
“Uh, really? You want to explain?” I asked.
She blew a bubble and twirled her scarf. “Nope, we can get to it later. Keep going. You’re doing great.”
I frowned but didn’t want to get totally off track. I was building up to the important part of my speech. “Well, moving on,” I said. My next map was the launch pad and runway, four square miles in the middle of the Florida wetlands surrounded by razor wire, checkpoints, and security dogs. “This is the real problem—Armstrong Field. We must evade all security and board The Adversity.”
“Oooh, look at all the dogs and razor wire. I bet it’s like a swamp out there, with swamp water and crocodiles,” quivered Sunjay. “Cats are really my favorite, you know? Cats are great. Maybe we should buy one—I can stay here and take care of the cat and you guys can go into space.”
Somehow Sunjay’s doubt gave me confidence. “You want to travel into space, Sunjay. I know you do. You ask my dad about his missions more than I do! You don’t need a cat. You need an adventure!” I smiled and patted his shoulder, like a coach giving a pep talk.
Tabitha blew another bubble and popped it loudly. Then she laughed. “Wait, so that’s the big problem, Tully? Razor wire and dogs? We can solve those problems with a shovel and some steaks.”
We waited for her to explain.
“Guys, that’s not a Tabism. You know, we can go under the fence if we dig with the shovel.”
“Ohhh! Well, what about the steaks?” asked Sunjay.
“Sunjay, would a dog rather eat you or a giant steak?”
“I don’t want to find out,” he said.
“Don’t worry. We won’t have to. I’ve got a better idea for getting past security, too,” she said, smacking her gum.
I didn’t feel confident like a coach anymore. I felt annoyed. “Okay, so you solved the big problems, Tabitha. I’m super impressed. So why are we sitting here? Let’s just go hop on board and wait for takeoff.” I thought that would shut her up, but…
“Tully, we need to plan all this out carefully. I didn’t mean it like that.” She stood up and walked over to the LiveWall. We looked at the picture of Armstrong Field. Tabitha pointed up and circled the sky above. “The real problem isn’t getting into space. I bet there are thousands of ways to get on board a spaceship. You will figure that out for us, for sure. No, it’s space! We have to hide and survive on a spaceship for several days. Otherwise, your dad will send us home in an escape pod.”
“Escape pods,” said Little Bacon, “offer astronauts a way to safely exit a spacecraft in the event of emergencies like fires, engine failures, or structural damage.”
Ugh, Tabitha was right. I sat down next to Sunjay on the couch and my butt nearly hit the ground. We watched Tabitha chew her gum and twirl with her lucky scarf for a minute before we could move.
“Astronauts get dozens of VIP passes to these launches, right?” she asked. I nodded. “Your Aunt from Alaska will take one and so will you. But if you act really lonely and we beg, maybe we can get passes, too. That will get us close to the ship, but it still doesn’t get us on board. We’ll have to look for that this week. Let’s figure out what we need.”
She wrote a list on the LiveWall: Get VIP passes. Find maps of The Adversity. Hiding spots on board. Learn about mission. Food? Water? Bathroom? “Okay, that’s all. Proceed.” She patted us both on the shoulder, coach-style, and sat back down between us on the couch. I was about to stand up and say something, but what could I say? I had only dwelled on a few of the problems. Sunjay must feel like this when he can’t jump at the right time in Cave-In! For the first time, I felt frustrated with beautiful Tabitha and was about to tell her that she could just go home and forget the whole thing. Then the garage door opened. Someone was downstairs. We all tensed up and listened.
“Hey, Harper to Mission Control. Tully, you up there?” my dad called from downstairs as he entered. The stairs leading up the Mission Control began to creak, and I heard the doorknob turn. I had only a second to jump up and swipe my hand across the screen to hide Tabitha’s list.
“Hey, Tully—and Sunjay and Tabitha. My meeting got canceled. Wow, all three of you, and Little Bacon. The three and a half musketeers in search of adventure!” he said, looking at us and back at the doorknob. I knew what he was thinking: Why are they up here with the door shut? He had a sort of unspoken “no doors closed” policy in the house—except, of course, for his office. How fair was that? He looked at the screen and frowned. “Hmmmm, that’s a cute kitten,” he said.
Oh, no. I remembered the last time I had used the LiveWall—I had pranked Sunjay with the kitten/zombie trick, and it was set to “kitten.”
“Commander Harper, yes, that’s our new kitten,” said Sunjay, shrinking deeper into the couch. “His name is, uh, Button. No, Buttonhole. He loves milk, yes, he loves it. MILK!” His hair flopped down into his eyes.
“Buttonhole. You named your cat Buttonhole?” my father said, with a red glint in his eyes. “Funny, but that looks like a mountain in the background of the picture. Yes, Mt. McKinley in Washington, if I’m not mistaken. I’ve climbed it several times. You’ve already been to Mt. McKinley with Buttonhole the cat? You three have had a busy day...”
We were in the process of getting busted. Have you been there before? Sunjay sunk further into the couch and pulled his knees to his chest, looking sheepishly up at my dad. I was still too frozen to think, but the ice was starting to thaw, and an idea began to warm my mind.
Dad put down his shopping bags and brought his hand to his chin. “I hate to say it, Sunjay, but you’re as transparent as a window. I can see right through you. Now, what were you three really doing?”
Tabitha jumped to her feet. “Commander, sir,” she said, fiddling with her scarf, “we do have something to confess.”
But before she finished, I grabbed her by the shoulder and thrust her back into the couch. I couldn’t let her give away our plan before we even started. I had to do something. I will not be left behind. “Dad, sorry, I should explain. We, well, let me just show you. You’ll need to sit down to hear this.”
He frowned even more deeply but sat down anyway, sinking between Sunjay and Tabitha on the squeaky old couch. Sunjay was pale. Tabitha blew a bubble so big it stuck to her nose and hung there for a second.
I always have the controller when things get tough, I thought. It’s just like Cave-In! I just need to find the right way out of here.
I turned out the lights and stood in front of the screen, a giant kitten peering over my left shoulder at the three people on the couch. And then I realized the way out. If I flick the screen to the right, he’ll see the map of the launch site and Tabitha’s list. But if I flick the screen to the left…
“Okay, Dad,” I said. “I’m glad you showed up when you did because we were planning something. Something really big, and it involves you. You might as well know what it is. I’m going to flick my hand across this screen, and when I do, you’ll see what we’ve been working on.”
My Dad leaned forward, and so did Sunjay and Tabitha. I don’t really know what any of them were expecting to see, but my dad should have seen it coming. The moment I flicked my hand across the screen, they saw it.
The picture of a screaming zombie.
“GRAAWWWLLLL!” growled the zombie. “GRAAWWLLLLLL!”
All three of them jumped back so hard they knocked over the old brown couch, their feet flying in the air. I couldn’t see their faces, but I heard laughter as they rolled into a giant ball on the far side of the room. It worked! I thought. We’re safe.
This was true. Sort of. Because my dad popped up, looked at Tabitha and Sunjay, and yelled, “Don’t stand there, you fools. Get him!”
The three of them bolted after me as I ran for the door, but my dad beat me there.
“Tully zombie head trickster genius boy!” yelled Tabitha. She and Sunja
y came from either side and grabbed my arms and my dad got my legs.
It didn’t take them long to drag me outside and chuck me into the pool—shoes, shirt, wallet, and all. They spared my holophone though—Dad didn’t want to replace that. As I sat on the edge of the pool squeezing water out of my pockets, I realized how close we had come to getting caught on the first day of real planning. If I had flicked my hand to the right, Dad would have seen our plans and grounded me for life. As punishment, I would have mowed every yard in the neighborhood until I went to college—unless Xanthar wanted to help. Fortunately, our secrets were safe.
PRIMARY OBJECTIVES
After the close call with dad, we came up with some planning rules. We had to prepare for unwelcome intrusions, first of all. Sunjay programmed the LiveWall to keep all our documents on one page. If any of us tapped the wall three times, this ancient movie called Star Wars would start playing in the background. Sunjay’s so random. I don’t know where he finds stuff like this, but it’s this cool old movie about a guy named Luke Skywalker. He lives on a farm in the desert with his aunt and uncle. A farm in the desert? I wasn’t sure what they farm, but whatever. Also, he has these special powers that he doesn’t really know about until he meets this mysterious old guy who shows him how to “use the Force” and trains him to fight with a “light saber,” which is just a laser sword. The special effects are incredibly cheesy, but hey, the story is good. Of course, there’s also a love story. Sunjay fell in love with Princess Leia. “Isn’t her hair awesome?” he said. Tabitha had no opinions on Leia’s hair but said the princess was too “complex” for Luke. “And besides, they’re too much like brother and sister. She would be better with Han Solo. But let’s get back to planning.” Okay, Tabitha. Whatever you say.
I said that to Tabitha frequently during our planning. She kept us focused while we planned, which annoyed me for some reason. I didn’t realize how often Sunjay and I just wandered off into random conversations.
